13 Little Heartless: The Tragedy that Never was
by CoifishAct
Summary: It's 1816, and a young boy named Roxas and his strange uncle live out thier life in Randsom, the family's broken down manor in Europe. A pretty boring time,but what happens when an unexpected invitation arrives from an old friend? *contains charac. death*
1. Chapter One

Author's Note* **WARNING! **this here fic contains some death of characters essential to the plot, So if you don't like, DON'T READ Anywho, enjoy the first chapt.- _my first fic! yay!_** 

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January 3, 1896

A young boy of fifteen sat patiently on the damp cornerstone, LOWZ STREET. 14 AVE. the many signs read as he stared aimlessly down the cold brick roads, containing little life. A few more moments passed, seeming like dull hours when suddenly across from him in the view of a lonely street light, some tavern doors flew open; releasing its load of laughter and drunken men unto the cruel streets that were London. From the back of that group, a man in black overcoat and many scars little his pipe, seeming to be the only one of the group who had not become completely stoned after a few drinks. He was after all, very well suited when it came to rationing his beer.

"Let's go Roxas."

The wind delivered the sound of his name, and in a matter of moment the boy stood side by side with his elder, a silken cap drown tight around his head as the rain began to fall. Such a cold litless rain, humming onto the streets as excess water sunk into the drains. Sprinkles of water lashed out and around both their feet a roaring coach and horses yielded to a steady trot and haulted before them.

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Chapter one: The Telegram

"Who in heaven sends telegrams in the middle of the night?"

A fustrated man in a scarlet master's chair glared angrily at the hands of a grandfather clock, the hour clearly reading to be half past one. IN. THE. MORNING. He growled as someone close leaned on the back of his threshold, growling with him. Neither of them noticed, but a rat with cheese ran quickly aross the floor board behind them.

"Well, It must be pretty dang urgent, because they sent the same thing like, 5 times within the last 8 minutes. Prob'ly just that Namine' chick huntin' for Roxas. That dame sure knows how to stalk someone….must just be me huh? Eh, I gotta go anyways." The blonde dropped the envelope unto a side table and turned to leave, footfalls causing a creaking echo beneath the deteriorizing wood floors of Randsom Manison, so deteroized to the fact the floor was almost green with neglect. It was an old house, but an even more forsaken one as the peeling wall paper and dust layered sofas so desperately made known.

Two souls currently occupied the place. Not doing it much good, but nevertheless, living in it. Sid, the House's chief and only rat exterminator(hasn't been doing the job lately), cook, coach driver and coach mechanic, worked shifts for the house but didn't really live there, Sir Randsom (Xigbar) who currently did nothing nor cared for much in the house ( and had quite the reputation for his pranks and the starting of rumors around town), and of course, the lovely nephew who never owned a lock in his life, nevertheless carried an unecessary ring of keys everywhere he went. (For security reasons as he liked to leave it.) These made up the trio who came here. Or _dared_ rather in this dump,with the roofs shaking and rattling with the meer ring of the storm outside. Oh, and that reminds me, the roof also had a leak in it. One per room. But, it wasn't too bad of a matter. Mansions as old as these never ran out of pots to catch the water as it eased through the ceiling cracks. Lovely, Right?

With a _sigh_ the man in the chair gave up, groaning as he snatched the letter up from the pin-holed table and tore it open with his nails. Tipping a wine glass to lips, his patched eye moved from left to right, he read:

_____dDEaR xIiGbar, gOuD FrIEzd OF mINeght_

" Holy Heck, I'm blind..." he fiddled through his coat pocket, grabbed is monocle, and holding it up to his eye tried again.

_Dear Xigbar, good friend of mine_

_I was searching through some old chests of mine recently, and came across something that struck me as a pleasant memory. Our old college photographs from Wells. Shocking right? We were quite young then weren't we? Well, I came to thinking about these pictures and thought, what would it hurt to gather up the gang again sometime? It would be a pleasure, and, more likely the perfect oppurtunity to exchange our adventures now as adults. Thus forwarding this invite._

_The party is on the fifth. You do have the old address still right? Same place, same me! Do come if you can._

_Best Regards,_

_Luxord of Arumond_

_p.s. Please bring Roxas with you! We would love to see him._

* * *

A glass forever lost its peace and hit the ground.

"SID! WHY- DIDN'T-YOU-O-MY-GOD-THE-FIFTH-TOMMOROW! ROXAS! Roxas! Get your hide down here, Now!"

Hurried and probably terrified stumping was heard as the upstairs groaned and creaked in age, keys rattling against soft trousers as a youth charged into the living room.

"Xigbar, What's wrong ? Is there a fire? Another one?"

"A fire? As if! But there will be A BEATING if don't get your bags packed!"

Roxas raised an eyebrow quizzically as his elder ran around the armchair and around the room, grabbing stuff from dressers, shelves, mantles, ANYTHING that was covered in at least 5 layers of dust was snatched up and hurled into a sack. Numbers on an old-fashioned communicator were also dialed in desperate need of a coachman..

"Sid! Sid! Yo? Who is this? What? His mama? Yeah hilarious. Look, I need you tell him that his services are needed here in- Yeah I- I know what time is! Just tell him to- yeah, Yeah ok. Thanks!"

He slammed the phone down, closing is eyes in concentration as he tried to remember the Station Yard's next train schedule. Finally hearing a noise he looked up, as _two_ rats with cheese and a very confused little boy stared at him with open mouths.

(Growl) "Roxas, why are you still here? C'mon kid, hustle, hustle!"

Running over and grabbing his hand, he fled with him into the direction of the stairs, the sound of the coach horses and heavier rain rumbling into the courtyard outside. Roxas wenced as his wrists were grabbed a hint too tightly, and nearly tripped as the edge of tattered carpet caught his heels.

" Xigbar, Where are we going? What's the hurry for? You weren't like this a few minutes ago! OW! Xigbar!"

Xigbar remained quiet as he checked the hands on his watch again; squinting his eyes and sighing as the smallest line read wrong once more. You see, most of the possessions in this house, both personal and formal, suffered casualties to some extent, and this watch just so happened to have a bent second hand. No matter however! For once the town of Arumond was reached by tommorow, they would just have to make it a point to aquire a new one! A Commodore's Clock maybe! They're never wrong, right? Procisely the thing they might need...

Er...That is, if he could find thier beloved sack of saved coins...

Coming back to earth from his thoughts, The taller of the two in his red robe and distinguished eyepatch managed to shake his agenda to the rear of his mind; pacing the stairway steps as a tired boy dragged on close beside him.

" Ah, don't fret about it to much, kiddo. Just think of this as- an early spring trip."

to be continued...

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****Whew! You made it past the first chapter. Now from here and down the road is when It may start to have a little language and er...drama, so look out for chapter updates and remember the death warning! :) r&r please?** _thankies_


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter two: Rolling Wood?

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_Spring trip? But we never go on vacations..._

Roxas peered up quizzically at his uncle beside him, who was currently busy with a map and random mumbling to notice. Not bringing much hope of a conversation.

And, it had begun a lite rain...

Looking out of the carriage window, he resided to thinking fore a while, watching in resolved silence as people on the streets ran to and yonder, hoping for an ecape from the drizzles of water. The water between the red bricks of the streets sort of fizzled around the sharp edes of the stone; forming tiny streams of water gushing into the city drains. It reminded him a liitle of the fountain back home, except that it particularly had lost most of it's luster over the years, no longer spewing fresh water, but more likely leaking it unto the driveway every evening. Just one of the many things that made randsom seem like home.

Wow, It was really getting dark out...

"Um, Xigbar?"

Few a few moments he was not acknowledged, but rather they carried on in silence while the footfalls of horses hooves carried them further into the outskirts of town; were the large clock tower London was known for could even barely be seen. With a low growl of fustration, the older man peered away from his paper and sighed.

"What, Roxas?"

"Why are we going on vacation? Y-you never mentioned it before..."

The stare he recieved was almost entranced like, until a chuckle sent the old man back to browsing his paper.

"You don't what to take a little trip? I thought you hated the city life." he looked up and sighed, " And _now_ you want to stay. Wow, you're strange for your age..."

"No, it's just- you never said anything about it ahead of time and- Its so sudden.."

Almost no sooner than he spoke, he was interrupted as a voice from somwhere outside and above mingled with the rain. " The kid's got a point. Someone may think you're losin your head to wanna travel in this weather! There aint nothin wrong with skippin a party..." a little pause and then, "...And with all those recent murders goin' around, that may not be a bad idea this late at night..."

" M-murders?"

Xigbar held a head outside of his window and frowned," We're first class, Sid! Top dog! We can't just "skip out..." And were have you been hearing about all this crime, huh? I told you you gotta stop believin' that stuff!"

He came back into the warmth of the carraige, head dripping with rain as he waited for an answer.

"Well, this guy down at the Raven seemed to know what he was talkin about, blabberin' on and on about how just last week ole' Smith Regard was found dead as a rail in his post office, big ole' blade in his spine."

"Tike's Smith Regard? The crazy guy from Parsons?"

"That's him. And 'member how they used to favor that Mr. Connors so much? Heh. Not anymore. The old dude just up and goes to the Train Route 60 for awhile, and...Bam! Find him hangin' from his own tie in the entrance.

" Stop!"

Roxas really didn't want to hear any more of it all, covering his ears in hope to keep any more tales of murder out of his head. A soft laugh and a poke in the rib shook him up a bit.

" Oh, whats up kid? Cid there didn't scare you up there, did he?"

He took his hands from his ears and shook his head quickly.

"Um, no. Its- just.. Let's change the subject."

"Alright, alright. Fine".

A brief silence followed, and soon after, the gentle beat of horse feet could be heard paving against the wet dirt road. It lasted about thirty-minutes, and soon the scarred man to the right of Roxas couldn't resist the erge to speak again.

"Well I don't really know about all that, but I will say that the old cheapskates probably deserved what they got, especially after that big rip off scandal they found themselves tryin to put on the market. I mean, who the hell gave those two the idea of a partnered contract in the first place?"

" Oh I don't know. What i say is they're probably just anxious about their new inventory. They think its really gonna sell ya know? Big If. They probably wont even go through the trouble to build the stuff right in the first place. Like yesterday. I went on over to see about some new wheels for the carraiges, and what do i find? Stuff that wouldn't be worth 5 pounds, thats what! Touch a hinge, and the whole darn thing's about ready to crumble into a crappy piece of shi-"

CLA-THUM thuum thuum Trrrmp!

a jerk and a bump sent the carraige into an abrupt hault with a screech, sending two heads caving against the interior of the coaches hard shell.

"Speak of the devil!..."

* * *

Roxas rubbed the now sore spot of his head and moaned, watching out of the window as a gaping hole now lay in the rear of where a fourth wheel should have been. He squinted out into drizzling rain.

"What happened? ...Why'd we stop?"

The lite sound of the reins were heard falling carelessly to the ground, two feet making thier way to the back of the wagon in a slow shuffle. Soon followed by the furious slamming of the carriage door .

" Just a another wheel, kid. Just another earth damned wheel..."

An obstacted piece of wood was wrapped up tightly in the hands of one of the men, and held out distinctly before Roxas' eyes to see .

" This part most likely came from the inside of the thing" he said. "You see that inside? Pure cardboard. A perfect example of what I mean by cheap."

Roxas observed it for a moment, taking it from Sid's hands and turning it round with his fingertips to get a better look of it. He tapped the center piece towards the center of his palm, leaving it to churn with the rain and disentegrate into a mess on his hands.

_Wow it's- really is worthless._..

He brushed off the pieces onto the ground, tiny shards of wood left to tumble into the dark rain; other traces of it rolling into the shadows the wagon, hidden forever.

One of these pieces, however, ran into niether of these places.

On, and on, a single shard of wood ran oveer the wet red dirt of the country road, never stopping, never slowing down until it lay before the presence of an obscured walkway; a few 10 ft. away from where they had stopped.

Peering through the window he strained to see through the falling drops of water as he watched it roll away, and then stop.

_I wonder where..._

Looking around to see that the two men had begun argueing over the state of the wheel, and were not minding him, he slowly unlatched the door to the outside; stepping out unto the cold dirt of a pavement. He eyed the place carefully where the wood had stopped rolling, part of him actually wondering why he even cared; and why he was out into the cold and rainy darkness of the nightime- curiosity getting the best of him. All in all, he just wasn't sure. But something in him wanted to know where that piece was going... or where it went...


End file.
